By Nasra Bishumba
The New Times

The United States’ city of Houston will July this year welcome hundreds of Rwandans from the whole world for Rwanda’s 2nd Convention on Diaspora participation in the development of Rwanda. The convention is scheduled for July 1 to 3.

In an e-mail sent to this reporter, Nkubito Bakuramutsa, the President of the Rwanda Convention Association said that the Houston convention will be “a stepping stone to get the Diaspora participation in the development of Rwanda to the level of countries like India or China”.

Bakuramutsa said that following President Kagame’s initiative to rebuild the Rwandan image, the Rwandan convention will follow on that momentum to make all participants to the Rwanda Convention the ambassadors of Rwanda.

The convention will also work towards marketing Rwanda to the world by rebuilding an image of dynamism, development and progress among other issues.

The convention will set a platform for creating a network of Rwandan professionals capable of setting Rwanda as a tourist alternative for the Diaspora and others, creating business networks in the Diaspora to boost tourism, consolidating resources for career building, legal services, education services and introducing real estate investment in Rwanda.

The organizers hope to use the convention to lure investors in real estate business which according to Bakuramutsa is a quick way to create an influx of foreign exchange in the country.

Bakuramutsa also said that the convention hopes to bring to the participants, the awareness of the different opportunities for investments in Rwanda, the possibilities offered to them given their purchasing power and introducing the opportunities in selling coffee and tea from Rwanda.

The convention organizers hope to use the Houston convention as a platform to invite the Diaspora to bring their skills, their knowledge and contribute to the effort of rebuilding Rwanda’s educational system by sending books, computers and lab tools.

The Houston convention is expected to provide guidelines for the 2006 convention tentatively scheduled for Kigali.

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